Chapter 17 So Far

  By the time Jem, Scout, and Dill are seated, Heck Tate is already on the witness stand. The prosecuting attorney, Mr. Gilmer, just told Tate to say what happened, and then he was done. He has the word of a white girl against a black man, and it's an all-white jury, he thinks he has a good chance of winning. Heck Tate said that Bob Ewell had said that Tom Robinson had beat and raped Mayella, so he went and arrested Tom. He is not an eyewitness. In his cross examination, Atticus asked Tate if they got a doctor for Mayella, and exactly what her injuries were. They did not get a doctor for her, even though if she had been beat and raped, a doctor to check on her is probably the first thing they should've done. Tate said that she had a black eye, her right one. The person who beat her had to have been left handed to hit her there. When he realizes that it was her right, Heck Tate's left, that was beaten up, he seemed to have realized something, and Tom Robinson looks up. Tate also said she had bruises all around her throat, not halfway. A person would have had to use two hands to leave bruises all around her throat like that. Next on the witness stand was Bob Ewell. Scout goes on to describe the living conditions of the Ewells, who live in abject poverty. It's not necessarily the Ewell children's fault that the are filthy and don't have manners (Burris Ewell), but more their father's. Their father is an ignorant man who uses the welfare he receives to buy alcohol for himself, while his children starve and are basically victims of this. Gilmer tells Ewell to describe what happened. He said that he was in the woods when he heard Mayella screaming, he sees Tom through the window in the act, gets caught in the fence, Tom's already out the front door when he heard Ewell, he gets himself free form the fence, checks on Mayella, and gets Heck Tate. 

During Heck Tate's testimony after Atticus's questions if Tate or Ewell had gotten Mayella a doctor or not, and the answer was no, Scout noticed that Jem had reacted in a way that nobody else in the courtroom had, and she assumed that Jem was just being dramatic, but couldn't ask him why because she was shushed upon asking. Scout could be right and Jem is just trying to be dramatic, or maybe Jem acted that way because he knows something about the case that Scout doesn't. Another thing is, what was the thing that Heck Tate seemed to realize during his testimony about Mayella's right eye being injured. I quote: "Mr. Tate blinked again, as if something had suddenly been made plain to him. Then he turned his head and looked around at Tom Robinson. As if by instinct, Tom Robinson raised his head" (Lee 225). What was it that Tate realized that Tom also reacted to?